Posted on Monday, 19 January 2015

Despite being born in the era of Danger Mouse, the naming of my new Australian friend Silas was in no way connected to the dastardly Baron Greenback of the cartoon series.

Since we were going in the same direction and were getting on famously, Silas and I booked a sleeper bus to Nha Trang, also on the coast.

The beds on the sleeper coach were arranged in three rows, lower and upper bunks, with two very narrow access corridors. I say beds, but they were half-way between beds and seats, giving the feeling of being in a cockpit – and quite troublesome to sleep in.

But I was lucky enough to get a window bed, so as morning broke I could enjoy views of the pretty paddy fields and the many strange sights of the Vietnamese highway. Along with the ubiquitous scooters ridden by fathers with their wives and multiple children on the back, I also saw a rack of half a dozen small sheep precariously fixed to the back of another motorbike.

Once in Nha Trang we found a clean, pleasant hotel with rooms for just $10 a night.

Nha Trang is famed for its beaches and its scuba diving, as well as for the sprawling waterpark called Vinepearl Land, situated on the old Hòn Tre Island opposite the city.

Nha Trang Bay, Vietnam

To this latter attraction we headed after lunch. The resort is connected to Nha Trang by an impressive cable car system, the cost of which was included in the Vinepearl $25 entry fee. It was a gloriously sunny day and we enjoyed splendid views of Nha Trang as we passed high over the channel. Little speedboats left miniature wakes in the glassy blue sea, the hazy greens of Nha Trang's hinterlands stretched out in the distance.

While I have never been a big waterpark fan, I admit I enjoyed Vinepearl with its huge slides. Some of these make you go extremely fast and are not for the feint-hearted. There were lots of adults enjoying the fun too, so we didn't feel too ridiculous.

Drinks and food were costly at Vinepearl, but it was a great day out.

Nha Trang attracts many backpackers and more affluent tourists from across the world, and as such offered an exciting night life. We had dozens of great restaurants and bars to choose from that evening.

The next day we met a friendly Vietnamese lady called Phuong who was staying in the same hotel. She was from the inland city of Dalat, high up in the hills to the west, and was in Nha Trang in search of a little excitement. We had dinner with her and she quickly invited us to her home, which she shared with her husband and two cats.

Dalat, Vietnam (xuanhuongho/Bigstock.com)

A couple of days after Phuong left Nha Trang we followed her up to Dalat by bus. Phuong and her husband were incredibly welcoming and generous. They cooked us some delicious food – including some wonderful tomato soup with grilled cheese that delighted our Western palettes. Little wonder we ended up staying for five days.

The couple had two 'British short hair' cats – but these were far fatter than any I had seen in the UK; they were truly enormous.

Phuong and her husband ran a houseware shop in town and took turns showing us around Dalat while the other ran the business.

Market in Dalat, Vietnam (xuanhuongho/Bigstock.com)

Due to its height, Dalat was much cooler than Nha Trang, and as such was used as a breezy bolthole by the imperialist French when they ran Vietnam. To ferry themselves back and forth the colonists built a railway up to Dalat and a beautiful Art Deco terminus, which calls to mind Normandy's Trouville-Deauville Station. We explored this old station one evening as the light faded and dark clouds slid overhead, giving the rusting old locomotives an especially ghostly appearance.

During our time in Dalat we also visited the famous "Crazy House", officially called Hằng Nga Guesthouse. Modelled on a huge banyan tree, this bizarre sculptural building had numerous little rooms secreted away, of the sort that might be inhabited by a hobbit. The whole structure had a spellbinding fairy-tale aspect.

Hằng Nga Guesthouse, Dalat, Vietnam

The couple introduced us to many of their friends, who were equally genial – one of whom even painted Silas's portrait in oils.

After five days Silas and I felt the need to move on, to return to the coast and our route northwards. Saying goodbye to our hosts and the huge cats, we reflected on how friendly Vietnamese people were – despite the stories one hears from travellers who got cheated now and again. Away from the tourist areas, the people of Vietnam were among the most amiable I had met in South East Asia.

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